Where parenting and Asperger's Syndrome meet

Walking on Sunshine

The day you buy your child her first pair of shoes is meant to be a red letter day, the seminal event on her journey towards mobility and toddler-hood, and a time to pat yourself on the back for a job well done. Trouble is, there’s no time to savour this feeling of satisfaction because as soon as they’re on her feet, the world shifts beneath your feet again.

It’s not like walking is necessarily a new thing for Izzie – she was standing with support at two months, walking with support at seven, and took her first unaided steps at eleven – but now she can put a dozen steps together, everything has changed. As soon as we slipped on those cutesy pink shoes she decided that crawling was for babies. Even if she only has to move a foot, she’ll stand and walk it now. Her determination knows no bounds.

Bow before me and my big-girl shoes!

Unfortunately, and here is the reason her first pair of shoes is not a day for celebration, she has also now decided that she’s too grown-up for a pushchair. She just wants to walk, walk, walk. But not just anywhere – she wants to walk where she wants to walk, irrespective of you.

We put on her shoes in the shoe shop and walked her around in them and that was that. She screamed like a frustrated banshee when we put her in the pushchair, screamed like we’d never heard her scream, and in public too. We figured we’d let her walk since she had new shoes on, a little treat.

Holding onto both my hands, she wandered around the square. So far, so good. But the second I walked her into a shop, she let go with one hand, pivoted on her heel and walked out again. So I steered her in, and she walked out again. And again. So I picked her up.

Oh my gosh. More screaming. ‘I’m a big girl, daddy! I go where I like!’

And it’s been that way ever since.

If you’re taking her somewhere she doesn’t want to go, she either lets go and turns, drags you in another direction, or else drops to the floor. This spirit of independence is rapidly turning into a spirit of defiance that we’re really going to have to keep an eye on!

She certainly wants to run before she can walk – literally! When we’re not holding her hands, she runs everywhere, that whole ‘I’m-falling-forward-so-I’ll-just-walk-faster-to-counteract-gravity’ thing. Which means that when she falls – and she’s falling a lot – she lands with a bang. Her legs are covered in bruises and she keeps throwing herself headlong into the furniture with no regard for her safety. But when she does, she’ll just pull herself back up to her feet and run on again, the imprint of a chair leg down the side of her face.

This devil-may-care attitude has extended to her rocking toys too. Sitting down is clearly too easy for a girl with big-girl shoes, too boring for someone who can (sort of) walk. So she does stunts that terrify the hell out of her daddy.

I call this one ‘standing on the crossbar with my butt overhanging the back’And this is called ‘holy shit she’s on one leg and still rocking!’

I have no idea where she gets it from.

No idea whatsoever…

So beware the day you buy your child her first pair of shoes – it might change things in ways you never expected.